Alrighty folks, here’s the big one. DC’s collections for the Fall months of 2015. There’s a lot of cool stuff in here so I’m going to separate it all into categories and then say a few words about most of the stuff in there. So let’s get to it, because there’s a lot to get to.

Absolute Editions:

Absolute Court of Owls – We just learned about this one with DC’s most recently solicits, so nothing new here.

Absolute Green Lantern/Green Arrow – This one’s exciting for sure. Dennis O’Neil and Neal Adams’ classic run is collected here, and while I’m not usually one for Absolutes I’m definitely going to have to jump on this one.

Omnibus:

Neal Adams Omnibus – The only Omnibus present here is the re-solicit for the Neal Adams Omnibus containing all his Batman material.

Deluxe Editions:

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns – I’m pretty glad they’re going back and releasing Deluxe Editions for a lot of these classic stories because many of them I only own in TPB, and I’m not really looking to cough up the dough on an Absolute that’s out of print at the moment.

Batman Year 100 – Another Batman book gets the Deluxe treatment, and makes me glad I held off on purchasing Paul Pope’s modern classic all this time. I love Pope and his style, so this one is sure to look fantastic on those Deluxe sized pages.

Batman/Superman/Wonder Woman: Trinity – I really don’t know anything about this story by Matt Wagner, but this is sure to be coinciding with the upcoming Batman V Superman movie given it features all three characters. I have to wonder if Wagner’s other Batman stories get the same treatment later on.

Crisis on Infinite Earths – This really is my favorite event that DC has ever done. So much happens and the art is just timeless and fantastic. I glad this is getting the OHC treatment because it really deserves it, and Perez’s highly detailed art will look great on those oversized pages.

DMZ: The Deluxe Edition Book Five – I believe this tops off the Deluxe Editions for this series from Vertigo.

Fables The Deluxe Edition Book Eleven

Green Arrow by Jeff Lemire – Now this one has me very excited. I loved this run on Green Arrow, and I was hoping we’d see it in some sort of oversized collection but I had figured that was a pipe dream. What’s cool is that it’s not the only New 52 Deluxe Edition we see in these solicits.

Kid Eternity – Grant Morrison’s old three part story with Duncan Fregedo is a great one, and one I’m happy to see get this treatment, but at this point it looks like DC and Vertigo are just stretching themselves to make sure that everything Morrison has ever done is printed on oversized pages in one way or another.

Multiversity – And speaking of Morrison… but this was obviously going to happen, and I had absolutely no doubt about it. I’ve loved Multiversity. I wouldn’t hesitate to name it as one of the best series of the year, and as a contender to take the top spot as far as DC events go for me. It has really reminded me why I fell in love with comics to begin with. That said, I’m glad to see it get this treatment asap.

Sandman Overture – This was in the last group of solicits too, so at this point I think they’re just trying to get lucky as far as when Gaiman’s actually going to wrap up this miniseries prequel to his seminal series.

Scalped Deluxe Edition Books Two and Three – Two more of the likely five volume set appear in these solicits.

Swamp Thing by Scott Snyder – Here’s the other New 52 one I was mentioning. I was definitely a fan of Snyder’s run on Swamp Thing, but in many ways it was Yanick Paquette (as well as Marco Rudy) who was the star here thanks to his amazing writing. So now that the door is wide open as far as New 52 Deluxe Editions goes I’m going to be expecting a lot more from DC in the near future. Especially coming off the news of this book in particular I’d expect something for Animal Man.

Sweet Tooth Deluxe Edition Book One – I’ve been waiting on this for a while. Lemire tweeted to me a while back that they were in talks to make this happen, so I’m excited that it’s finally on the way. Sweet Tooth is one of my very favorite Vertigo titles, so it’s a joy to get it on oversized pages. Lemire’s artwork and storytelling is going to thrive in this format.

Wonder Woman: Earth One Vol. 1 – This is pretty much the only one in this section that I’m really pumped about. This would be the Grant Morrison and Yanick Paquette Wonder Woman story that they’ve been working on for a while now. They’ve teased it, but we haven’t seen much for it, so it’s a complete surprise to actually see it solicited. Hopefully it truly will be on shelves by the end of the year!

Vertigo Collections

100 Bullets Book 3

American Vampire Vol. 7

American Vampire Vol. 8

American Vampire Vol. 9

Astro City

Astro City Confession

Astro City Private Lives

Children’s Crusade – Apparently this only includes Neil Gaiman’s material for this Vertigo event, and not all the Annuals from the various Vertigo titles that tied into it… which is a bit disappointing.

Coffin Hill Vol. 3

Effigy Vol. 1

Fables: The Wolf Among Us Vol. 1

FBP: Federal Bureau of Physics Vol. 4

Flinch Book One – The beginning of trade collections of Vertigo’s 16 issue anthology series.

Get Jiro: Blood and Sushi

John Constantine Hellblazer Vol. 12 How to Play With Fire – More from the Paul Jenkins run, and likely the last volume of his material collecting from issue #121. He wrote through #128 so I have to wonder if this is going to collect a bit past that. Perhaps Garth Ennis’ “Son of Man” arc will be in here, meaning volume 13 will wind up collecting the Warren Ellis material. Now THAT, I’m looking forward to.

The Kitchen

Mad Max: Fury Road

Strange Sports Stories

Suiciders Vol. 1

Swamp Thing: Darker Genesis – Creators listed for this one are Will Pfeifer and Pete Woods, but the only issues I can think of by Will Pfeifer are two issues from Swamp Thing Vol. 4 between Andy Diggle and Josh Dysart’s runs. Now it would be possible DC is doing new collections of that series since it was never collected in its entirety (he Pfeifer issues and the last several issues of Dysart’s run aren’t in any of the TPB’s), but I’m not sure where Pete Woods factors in as he didn’t supply any art for that run (as far as I can recall). Either way I’d have been happier to see DC/Vertigo working on continued collections for the Millar run.

Wolf Moon

Y: The Last Man Book Three

Classic/Reprint Collections

For lack of a better name… anything that’s not a modern series getting a new TPB collection. As always, there’s a lot of interesting stuff in here.

Art Ops Vol. 1 – I have yet to find what this one actually is, so if anyone knows feel free to inform.

Bad Girls – Reprinting the Darwyn Cooke miniseries.

Batman Adventures Vol. 3 – A third volume for the classic comic that told stories in the universe of the animated series of the 90’s.

Batman v. Superman – A movie tie-in collection giving classic comics where the two characters face off against each other.

Batman: Road to No Man’s Land – DC’s been doing really well these past several years to release new collections to give readers a pretty solid run of all the modern Batman comics. This one would fill in a gap between the upcoming new edition of Cataclysm and the first Batman No Man’s Land collection.

Batman: Shaman – A new printing of the first five issues of the Legends of the Dark Knight series.

Batman: The Doom That Came To Gotham – This one reprints a three issue Elseworlds comic from Mike Mignola.

Batman: War Games Vol. 1 – I had this as part of my “wish list” not terribly long ago, as this would be another good thing to add to DC’s recent complete TPB collection of modern Batman tales.

Birds of Prey Vol. 1 – A collection of early Birds of Prey material from Chuck Dixon.

Boy Commandos by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby Vol. 1

Catwoman Vol. 4: The One You Love – There was a lot of debate as to whether DC would go forth and collect the issues of the pre-New 52 Catwoman series post-Brubaker’s run. Well, here we finally a new collection for the first chunk of issues by writer Will Pfeifer. The series ran under his pen until it concluded at issue #82, so I really have to wonder if DC will actually put forth the work to collect the entire run. I’d expect it to take another three or four volumes to conclude the title.

Deathstroke The Terminator Vol. 2 – A second collection of Marv Wolfman’s series.

Demon: Haunted Glory – A collection of Garth Ennis’ Demon stories dealing with the origin of Hitman. Likely coming from the fact that Ennis’ has a new book coming from DC in June starring some of the characters from the series.

The Flash by Geoff Johns Book One – TPB reprints of Johns’ old Flash run starring Wally West. It’s not surprising that DC’s letting the Omnibus’ go out of print knowing that they’re printing the series in these TPB collections. I’m hoping, though, that we see his later material with Barry Allen also published as part of this line.

Graphic Ink: Darwyn Cooke

Green Arrow Vol. 4: Blood of the Dragon – Another collection of Grell’s 80’s series. Every passing group of solicits I’m hoping more and more that we see a volume of this series announced because it would be truly disappointing to see DC stop collections of this title like they have with so many other trade collections. Speaking of, this group of solicits doesn’t have volumes of either Ostrander’s Martian Manhunter nor Spectre titles, so that could be a bit concerning…).

Green Lantern: A Celebration of 75 Years

Immortal Doctor Fate – Apparently this one’s just a collection of a lot of various classic stories before the late 80’s ongoing series.

Justice League A League of One – Looking online all I find for this one is a graphic novel from Christopher Moeller, so this may just be a reprint of that.

Luthor

Metalzoic – A 1986 original graphic novel from Pat Mills and Kevin O’Neal.

New Teen Titans Vol. 3 – Another collection of the classic Wolfman/Perez era on the series.

Robin Vol. 1 Reborn – So it looks like now they’re collecting Tim Drake’s ongoing series, which is another awesome thing to happen.

Secret Six Vol. 3 – Collecting issues #14-24 of Gail Simone’s series, suggesting that there will be a fourth and final volume to collect 25-36

Showcase Presents Batman Vol. 6

Showcase Presents Blue Devil Vol. 1

Showcase Presents The Flash Vol. 5

Star Spangled War Stories Vol. 1 – I don’t believe this is a collection of the New 52 series, so this might be a first collection of the classic title of the same name.

Suicide Squad Vol. 1 Trial by Fire – DC is reprinting their first TPB collection of Ostrander’s Suicide Squad, hopefully suggesting that they’ll actually be releasing further collections of the series, as vol. 2 was solicited years ago and then cancelled. This is obviously coming out in time for the movie, but I’d say that the Suicide Squad has been granted increased popularity in the past few years thanks to their appearances is other media like the Arrow TV show. Hopefully they actually make it all the way through the 66 issue run.

Alright, well that’s all of what we got this time around. There’s plenty that I’m pretty excited about in there, so sound of and let us know what you’re looking forward to from DC and Vertigo this fall!

Here are this weeks Collected Edition Shipping and Product updates:
DC ENTERTAINMENT
• Batman: Arkham Knight Vol. 1 (FEB150258) has been upgraded to a hardcover edition with a new cover price of $19.99.
MARVEL COMICS
• Bucky Barnes, Winter Soldier TP Vol. 1: Man on Wall (FEB150868) will now be $16.99, not $12.99.
• King Size Kirby Slipcase HC (FEB150841, $200) now includes material from Tales to Astonish (1959) #1 and #13, in addition to what has already been solicited.

Here are this weeks Collected Edition Shipping and Product updates:
MARVEL COMICS
• Marvel’s Avengers: Age of Ultron Art of the Movie Slipcase HC (FEB150846, $49.99) will be 336 pages, not 240 pages.
• Damage Control TP Complete Collection (JAN150906, $34.99) has been cancelled and will be resolicited at a later date.
• The poster included in the Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars Battleworld Box Set Slipcase HC (JAN150885, $500) will be a 24” X 36” Secret Wars Ross Cloth Poster.

It’s Solicitation time again! Leading the pack this month is DC with a good number of books that we’ve already known about for a little while, but let me run through what is notable in my opinion. Here’s the full solicits (including singles and collectibles) for June 2015. Here’s what I’m looking forward to:

Batman: The Jiro Kuwata Batmanga Vol. 2

I really dug the first volume of this three volume set, so it’s just exciting to get more. Fans of the character, and especially those into manga or anime, owe it to themselves to grab these books. And at $13 a pop they’re not a bad investment.

Aquaman: Sub-Diego

I’m of the persuasion of people who missed out on most Aquaman stories growing up. The New 52 helped to give us an awesome new ongoing title from Geoff Johns (now from Jeff Parker and later from Cullen Bunn), but there’s a severe lack of older collections for the character. DC seems to be rectifying this a bit with collections like this one. I’ve heard a lot of good about this storyline from Will Pfeifer and Patrick Gleason so I might have to grab it when it releases.

Absolute Batman: The Court of Owls HC

I don’t recall seeing this solicited before, so this could be new… anyway, as it suggests this will be an Absolute collection of the first eleven issues of Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo’s Batman series. I’m hoping to see solid collections of Snyder’s run across Absolutes, but I’m pretty sure this is more likely to follow the Johns Green Lantern formula in that we’ll get a few Absolutes and then when the run is finished we’ll get a more complete collection across an Omnibus or two.

Green Arrow: The Archer’s Quest Deluxe Edition HC

Originally the Kevin Smith stuff was to be in a Deluxe HC, but that got bumped up to Absolute and now we’ve got this OHC to join that one which collects the issues by Brad Meltzer (16-21) following that run. So yeah, this is going to be a pretty thin book, but it ought to be a nice companion to that Absolute and I’m hoping we see more OHC’s for the run that followed Meltzer (Scott Beatty and Ben Raab for a few issues before Judd Winick took over for a while).

Superman Vol. 6 The Men of Tomorrow

Now that we know Johns isn’t sticking around after issue #39 it makes this collection a bit more interesting. This has the entire arc by Geoff Johns and John Romita JR which introduces new characters, now powers, and a new (albeit brief) costume. I’ve been enjoying this run thus far so I might have to grab this book when it hits shelves.

Will Eisner’s The Spirit: A Celebration of 75 Years

I don’t usually go for these sort of anniversary collections, but this one’s got me interested. I’ve not read a lot of Spirit stuff, but I’m intrigued by the Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman stories collected in here.

Wonder Woman by George Perez Omnibus Vol. 1

I’ve been looking forward to this one since it was first announced, but an interesting thing to note is that they added that “Vol. 1″ to the end of it. There was voiced concern that DC wasn’t going to collect the entirety of Perez’ run on the series, but I think this gives us a little more faith that they’re trying to work on that. Maybe they’ll collect the Messner-Loebs run that followed, which would be nice as I haven’t read any of that material.

Fables Vol. 22 TP

If you’re a Fables reader you probably know that all their anniversary issues are increasingly bigger and bigger. Issue #100 was like a thin TPB itself, and now they’re jumping the gun and the final issue, #150, is doubling as the 22nd volume of the series clocking in at over 150 pages. I’m a bit behind, so I’m definitely going to need to do some catching up for this one, but I’m excited to see how Bill Willingham and company bring this modern classic to a close (and I have my fingers crossed for some Omnis in the future).

Scalped Deluxe Edition Book Two HC

The second in what looks to be a five volume set collects issues #12-24 of Jason Aaron and RM Guerra’s amazing series. The first volume came out recently and is a thing of beauty, so I’m really excited to get more of those books and have the complete series in OHC. If you’ve never read Scalped then I really recommend it and there’s no better way to experience it than in these books.

That’s all for these solicits, but keep your eyes peeled for more stuff and let me know what’s enticing you from DC in June!

Well X-Fans! I’ve finally finished the second X-Men Omnibus, effectively taking me to the point that the series went on hiatus. I actually finished about a week ago but got a bit busy so here’s the video now… Lots of amazing artwork to talk about in these issues, and some of the best stories of the X-Men yet. I have to say it’s all thanks to artists like Jim Steranko and Neal Adams, who deliver the most attractive work on the series to date. Check me out on Instagram at ryleym0 to see images of all the comics I’ve been reading during this readathon so you can see all the awesome art I’ve been talking to. Thanks again for watching! Make sure to like, comment, subscribe, and all that cool stuff!

Coming in at #1 is J. Michael Straczyncski’s Superman: Earth One Volume Three (DC Comics). Image has seven books in the top 10 while Marvel had 2. Dark Horse entered the list at #37 with The Complete ElfQuest Volume 2 and IDW’s top book is Harlan Ellison’s Star Trek: The City on the Edge of Forever: The Original Teleplay at #39.

The one big surprise on the list was at #13 with Scott McCloud’s The Sculptor from St. Martin’s Press and :01 First Second Books.

Here’s the entire list:

TOP 100 GRAPHIC NOVELS
Based on Total Unit Sales of Products Invoiced in February 2015

A Few Notes about the upcoming ORION OMNIBUS
I received comp copies of the Orion Omnibus from DC Comics late yesterday afternoon. I believe it’s due out in a few weeks. The physical package is nicely done, but I have decided to express publicly, in a way I rarely do, that I am very disappointed in the book.

As some of you may remember, many of the issues of my run on the title consisted of a lead story and a short backup story. I got a lot of my friends, including Dave Gibbons, Frank Miller, Howard Chaykin, Jim Lee, Eddie Campbell and others to draw the back ups. I wrote most of the twelve stories. Generally, the backup stories were related in some way to the lead story. Sometimes, it was matter of atmosphere. Sometimes it was some sort of continuation of thematic material from the lead story. In the case of the Arthur Adams drawn story in Orion 10, there was a direct connection to the lead story, focusing on and specifically answering some of the questions I’d posed there.

My only connection to the Omnibus was early on. I learned of the upcoming collection like most other folks, by catching the announcement at last year’s San Diego ComicCon. I had some brief contact with DC afterwards about the Omnibus, and supplied a few high res scans for drawings as requested. I also drew a new cover for the volume. And that was it. I will say that in the case of other reprints elsewhere, I have generally been kept in the loop more, often to the extent of seeing pdfs of the entire volume and collaborating on the final form of the book before it heads off to press.

Nevertheless, I was thrilled Monday afternoon when I received a box of complimentary copies in the mail from DC. As I said above, it’s a very nice package.

However, I was dismayed when I began looking through the book and discovered that all of the backup stories for the issues, although included in the volume, have been separated from their lead stories and stripped of their context by putting them in the back of the Omnibus, in a separate section behind all the lead stories. And they aren’t entirely in order in that section either.

To say I was dismayed at these discoveries is probably too gentle a word, but what’s the point of going further? What’s done is done. It seems unlikely that there will be future collections of the same material. I feel it’s some of my best work, and I am very unhappy that the stories in this collection are never going to be read in the correct order by anyone except perhaps by extremely die hard fans of the work, or by people who simply go back and buy the original back issues.

The one bright note is that Dan Didio told me, after I spoke to him about the matter this afternoon, that if the book is reissued in paperback at some point down the road, he would do everything he could to see that all of the stories are printed in the correct order in that edition.

That would be nice.

Walter Simonson
March 10, 2015

It’s too bad that DC has made such a poor product. I sincerely hope that the editors get their act together and fix this hardcover by way of a recall and do not wait for the trade paperback for corrections, as Dan Didio stated above. Unfortunately, in order to get a trade, that hardcover usually has to sell out to warrant the demand for a softcover printing.

I was really looking forward to buying this book, but I think I’ll be passing on it now.